The 28th International Conference on Database Systems for Advanced Applications (DASFAA 2023) , hosted by DASFAA Steering Committee and co-organized by Tianjin University, was successfully held in Tianjin during April 17-20. This year, the Conference brought together a total of more than 350 pundits, scholars and scientists from 23 countries and regions, including China, France, South Korea, Japan and Australia, to discuss the latest research, applications and future development of database systems.

The Conference opened on the morning of April 18. Yang Huan, a member of the Standing Committee of the CPC Committee and Head of the Publicity Department of Tianjin University, delivered a speech at the opening ceremony.

Yang extended a warm welcome to all the experts and representatives attending the meeting and made a brief introduction to Tianjin University. Chen Lei, Chair of the DASFAA Steering Committee and Professor of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou), and Feng Zhiyong, General Chair of DASFAA 2023 and Professor of College of Intelligence and Computing, Tianjin University, addressed the conference respectively. They called on all pundits and scholars to make joint efforts to promote further development of database system research and application and hoped that this Conference would be a gathering for the participants to enhance understanding, strengthen cooperation and inspire creativity. Wang Xin, Chair of the DASFAA 2023 Program Committee and Professor of College of Intelligence and Computing, Tianjin University, presided over the opening ceremony and introduced the proceedings and accepted papers of the Conference.

Yang Huan delivers a welcoming speech.

Chen Lei, Chair of the DASFAA Steering Committee and Professor of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou)

Feng Zhiyong, General Chair of DASFAA 2023 and Professor of College of Intelligence and Computing, Tianjin University

Wang Xin, Chair of the DASFAA 2023 Program Committee and Professor of College of Intelligence and Computing, Tianjin University

Four keynote speeches were scheduled during the Conference.

Dr Sihem Amer-Yahia, Director of the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), gave a keynote speech titled "Towards AI-Powered Data-Informed Education", elaborating on how to promote a benign interactive integration of digital teaching platforms and learners by combing AI technology and data-informed method with modern education theory.

Dr Sihem Amer-Yahia gives a keynote speech.

Kyuseok Shim, Professor of Seoul National University and Academician of the Korean Academy of Engineering, gave a keynote speech titled "Cardinality Estimation of Queries in Database Systems - Where are we now?" He reviewed the development of researches on query optimizer of cardinality estimation in database systems, introduced the latest research progress of it based on deep learning model, and stressed its advantages over traditional methods.

Professor Kyuseok Shim gives a keynote speech.

Angela Bonifati, Professor of Lyon 1 University, gave a keynote speech titled "Property Graphs to Graph Ecosystems: A Round Trip". The report noted the wide application of and large demand for graph data, introduced property graph model and its query processing mechanism and schema definition language, emphasized the importance of efficient graph query processing technology for the construction of graph ecosystem, and pointed out the future research direction in this field.

Professor Angela Bonifati gives a keynote speech.

Xu Jianliang, Head and Professor of the Department of Computer Science, Hong Kong Baptist University, gave a keynote speech titled "Large-scale Geospatial Analytics: Challenges and Opportunities". Xu clarified that geospatial analytics methods and techniques are essential to big data analysis in multiple fields, highlighted the latest efficient methods and tools for large-scale geospatial data analysis, and illustrated potential research opportunities in this field.

Professor Xu Jianliang gives a keynote speech.

A panel discussion was held under the theme "What does LLM (ChatGPT) Bring to Data Science Research and Education? Pros and Cons". Professor Chen Lei from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou) and Professor Yang Xiaochun from Northeastern University are co-chairs of the panel discussion. Four keynote speakers Dr Sihem Amer-Yahia, Prof Kyuseok Shim, Prof Angela Bonifati and Prof Xu Jianliang, as well as a special guest Prof Li Guoliang from Tsinghua University, attended the discussion, elaborating on the impact of the Language Large Models represented by ChatGPT on data science and education from different perspectives with vivid cases.

Panel Discussion

Two industry invited talks were held during the Conference. Zhou Yan, co-founder of Createlink Technology, demonstrated the applications of native distributed graph Database-Galaxybase in the financial industry. Xu Dawei, R&D Director of TechFantasy, introduced the overall architecture of Knowledge Graph OggDB developed based on openGauss and looked forward to the future development route.

Zhou Yan and Xu Dawei present industry invited talks.

Seven tutorials were held during the Conference, covering self-supervised learning for recommendation, AI-powered knowledge graph management, fusion of relational and graph database techniques, cyber attack investigation based on provenance graph, approximate computation for big data analytics, sequential recommendation and redesign of distributed relational databases.

Four workshops were held on April 4, a day before the opening of DASFAA 2023, including the 9th International Workshop on Big Data Management and Service (BDMS 2023), the 8th International Workshop on Big Data Quality Management (BDQM 2023), the 7th International Workshop on Graph Data Management and Analysis (GDMA 2023) and the 1st International Workshop on Bundle-based Recommendation Systems (BundleRS 2023).

A total of 652 papers were submitted to and reviewed by the DASFAA 2023 Program Committee. 125 full research papers (acceptance ratio of 19.2%), 66 short research papers, 15 industry track papers and 15 demo papers were accepted by the Program Committee and published by Springer as LNCS conference series proceedings. Sessions were subdivided into 18 research sessions, 2 industry sessions, 2 poster sessions and 2 demo sessions, covering query processing, systems and optimization, spatial-temporal data management, knowledge graph and graph data, recommendation, machine learning, text processing, privacy computing, etc.

As reviewed by the DASFAA 2023 Program Committee, the Conference established two Best Paper Awards, one Best Student Paper Award, one Best Student Paper Award Runner-up and one Best Demo Paper Award.

Nominated and evaluated by DASFAA Award Committee, Professor Chen Lei won the DASFAA Outstanding Contributions Award.

The group photo of the conference

The International Conference on Database Systems for Advanced Applications is a well-known international academic conference in the database area. It has been 34 years since the first DASFAA Conference held in 1989. DASFAA is a CCF Class B international conference recommended by the Chinese Computer Society. The Conference focuses on the forefront of international research and development in the field of database systems and applications and deepens international academic cooperation and exchanges in database-related fields, aiming to provide an international cooperation and exchange platform for database researchers and enterprises to share research results, discuss current difficulties and challenges, and explore frontier technologies.

By Dang Xinuo

Editor: Eva Yin